WordPress for iOS finally received a new update yesterday (August 21) after a period of almost a month. Turns out, the Automattic team that runs the app as well as popular WordPress.com blogging service was blocked by Apple from pushing new app updates as it was not offering an in-app purchase option for WordPress.com’s paid plans and domain purchases, the company’s founder and CEO Matt Mullenweg has revealed.
The presence of in-app purchases in the WordPress app would allow Apple to take up to 30 percent cut of all revenue that the app generates using the in-app purchases.
“Heads up on why @WordPressiOS updates have been absent… we were locked by App Store,” Mullenweg wrote on Twitter. “To be able to ship updates and bug fixes again we had to commit to support in-app purchases for .com plans.”
At the time of publishing, the Automattic team had already relented and conveyed to Applethat it would add in-app purchases in the WordPress.com within 30 days. This surrender led to the resumption of app updates for Wordpress for iOS app.
What was WordPress doing wrong, at least in Apple’s eyes?
While the WordPress app itself doesn’t sell anything and is free-to-use for anyone, it has support pages that send users wanting to purchase one of paid WordPress.com plans or domains to a webpage on its website using webview (an internal browser). This was reportedly the bone of contention and why Apple wasn’t allowing the Automattic team to push app updates until WordPress app brings this whole plan purchase process within the app using the in-app purchase mechanism.
According to Mullenweg, the Automattic team told Apple that they could block the support pages that talked about the paid plans in the iOS app; however, Apple rejected the offer.
With no other option apart from publishing another app that included in-app purchases and fixing the current one of get rid of any and every paid plan mention, the Automattic team will now be adding in-app purchases in the WordPress app.
Mullenweg’s revelations on Twitter about Apple’s arm twisting have caused an uproar at a time when Apple is already dealing with the Fortnite makers on both legal and PR frontsfor removing the hugely popular game from its App Store for adding another payment mode for in-app purchases that would have left the Cupertino, California-based giant without any cut.
Fortnite developers aren’t the only ones with an issue with revenue share taken by Apple or the so-called Apple tax. Spotify has time and again pushed back. Regulators are also looking into Apple and whether there are any antitrust issues with the App Store.
